The Peculiarity of American Conservatives

Gordon Brown's recent "interaction" with Gillian Duffy got me thinking about how different American democracy is from others around the world. (Not that Americans wouldn't let their inflammatory comments get accidentally caught by a live mic: See Jesse Jackson's desire to neuter Barack Obama and Joe Biden calling health care reform a "big fucking deal.") A sitting head of state is talking one-on-one with a regular Jill for a few minutes straight. Now maybe this sort of thing only gets press when the candidate shoots themselves in the foot right afterward, but when I think of a presidential campaign in the U.S., I picture giant rallies, not candidates taking time for individual voters.

A further difference, as Joseph Romm points out, is that all three major British parties--Labour, Conservative, and Lib Dem--favor taking action on climate change, while Republicans in the U.S. remain defiantly anti-science. Even the military cannot sway right-wing minds on global warming. The opposition (on this and other issues) is so extreme that commentators are wondering if Republicans have insulated themselves from constructive criticism.

Julian Sanchez argues that this right-wing insularity comes from some combination of:

1. reactions to progressive viewpoints invading traditionally conservative areas via the Internet, and
2. conservative institutions (like Fox News) striving to counter a perceived liberal bias in institutions (like the New York Times) that are really striving for objectivity.

While this may be true, it begs the question, "Why isn't conservative opposition in Great Britain so insulated and belligerent?" Part of it may be that there are established conservative institutions in Britain that also strive for objectivity. Part of it may also be that British conservatives are insulated and belligerent by British standards.

But I contend that there is another reason for American peculiarity, and it stems from our differences in democracy. The United States is almost unique among OECD countries in having a presidential republic. (Mexico and South Korea are the only others, excluding the so-called "semi-presidential" republics like France and Russia, where both a president and prime minister wield executive power.) The GOP can accomplish their political goals by gumming up the Senate and ensuring that Democrats achieve as little as possible before the Republicans retake Congress. Almost every European nation has a parliamentary system, where consensus- and coalition-building is integral. There it doesn't make sense, for instance, for the Tories to make the Lib Dems their bitter enemies when the Lib Dems will likely decide who Britain's next prime minister will be.

The Sinkable Gordon Brown

As if public discontent with Britain's burgeoning national debt did not spell enough problems for Gordon Brown and his Labour Party, Brown was caught calling a voter "bigoted" after a short exchange earlier today. His comments were caught as Brown talked to an aide in his motorcade, not realizing that his mic attached to his lapel was still on. The woman did not even say anything that bigoted besides a short aside on Eastern European immigrants. Judge for yourself:

Brown apologized, but, well, look at what's dominating BBC News's election coverage:

The crazy thing is that, according to most polls, Labour will win a plurality of seats in the House of Commons, even though polls are placing Labour third in the popular vote. (British MPs, unlike in other parliamentary systems, are elected by district, like the U.S. Congress.) It is likely that neither Labour nor the Conservatives will win an outright majority of seats, leaving a hung Parliament.

One of the parties must then form a governing coalition with the third-party Liberal Democrats. Although the Lib Dems' ideology would fit better with Labour than the Tories, the Lib Dems' platform includes instituting a proportional voting system. Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has even said, "It is just preposterous the idea that if a party comes third in the number of votes, it still has somehow the right to carry on squatting in No 10." Either way, it should be an interesting election come May 6.

A Dangerous Precedent

There's a Facebook group called "DEAR LORD, THIS YEAR YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTOR, PATRICK SWAYZIE. YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE ACTRESS, FARAH FAWCETT. YOU TOOK MY FAVORITE SINGER, MICHAEL JACKSON. I JUST WANTED TO LET YOU KNOW, MY FAVORITE PRESIDENT IS BARACK OBAMA. AMEN." It has over a million members.

Now, there is a slight difference between wishing Obama would die and wishing somebody would kill him. But with over a million members, I'm willing to bet at least one of them has made that leap.

This should be self-evidently dangerous. Democracy cannot flourish when people demand the deaths of everyone with whom they disagree. One of the reasons that the Weimar Republic failed is that communist and liberal leaders like Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht, and Walter Rathenau were assassinated with at least the tacit support of respected conservatives.

I'm not saying you can't disagree with Barack Obama. You can contest him through legitimate means like protests, petitions, lawsuits, elections, and so on. You have the right to free speech, but wishing someone dead is something that should be reserved for the bin Ladens of the world.

iSeeYou! Big Brother Issues iMacs

While the Harrington High School teen's story seems disturbing, it seems to be equally extreme to remove these types of tracking technologies off of computers in the event that they are stolen. In this particular instance, based on the one-sided comments of the plaintiffs, the school's actions crossed the line when, after reaching an agreement about the computer insurance fee and realizing that the computer was not in fact stolen, chose to repeatedly activate the photo-tracking technology and delete the pictures.

However, the family is also responsible for reading and understanding the terms of the agreement regarding the insurance fee and what programs will be activated. These tracking technologies, while out of place in this particular instance, are a valuable security measure for recovering a missing or stolen computer (as long as the thief is not smart enough to cover the microphone and camera) and it makes sense for the school to have such measures in place. CNN reports that "the school district installed the LANrev webcam security system for use if the laptop is reported lost, missing or stolen."

Unfortunately, this story does not make clear the response of the Lower Merion School District school district nor its current actions after the Robbins family filed their lawsuit. According to this article, "both state and federal officials are investigating the district for possible wiretap violations."

The New York Times reports that "using this surveillance capability, school officials found images that led them to believe that Blake Robbins, a 15-year-old student, was using illegal drugs. Mr. Robbins said the 'pills' he was seen consuming were Mike and Ike candies." However, if the purpose of the camera activation technology is to prevent theft or damage to the laptops, as the school states, then it is irrelevant whether or not the school thought that the student was consuming illegal drugs, as the computer was not damaged nor was it stolen. As the editorial in the New York Times pointedly argues, "If the district was really worried about losing the laptops, it could have used GPS devices to track their whereabouts or other less-intrusive methods. Whatever it did, the school had a responsibility to inform students that if they accepted the laptops, they would also accept monitoring."

Yes, the school district does bear the responsibility of informing the students about the technology with which the laptops are equipped, but in the digital age, it is also important for individuals to know and understand these technologies and their proper usage. The laptops did not belong to the students and if the students take them home under the terms of the agreement made with the school, it seems unreasonable to expect complete privacy using property belonging to a public school district. Despite all of these factors, based on the available information, the school district grossly overstepped its rights when realizing that, as the laptop was not missing, damaged, or stolen, and still chose to activate and reactivate the software.

Nothing for Something

Earlier this month, President Obama announced a plan to open much of the Atlantic and Arctic seaboards for offshore drilling. Most view it as a means to get Republicans and conservative Democrats in the Senate on board for a climate-change bill. But given that the Republican-bloc strategy is to oppose everything that Obama and the Democrats propose, this move raises fears that--in the words of Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ)--that Obama is "giving up something for nothing."

But perhaps Obama is being craftier that Menendez lets on. The move may convince a few moderate senators to vote for a climate bill. Or it may make it easier to paint Republicans as unthinking, obstinate reactionaries who care more about scoring political points than making good-faith attempts to improve the country. This should give Democrats a useful political argument for the 2010 mid-terms, also theoretically making it easier to pass a climate bill.

Now here's the kicker: Most of the land offshore won't be open for drilling until 2012. Who knows what the economics of energy will be like then, especially if a bill passes in 2010/2011? It may not be worth the cost to energy companies to explore and drill offshore, in which case Obama would be getting something for nothing.

But these are high stakes, and the fact remains that we can't drill our way out of global warming. We can't even drill our way to energy independence. The only solution is to replace fossil fuels with wind, solar, and even nuclear energy. So let's make sure that in the course of his political gamesmanship, Obama does not lose sight of that.

Don't Let's START

On April 8, President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev, signed a new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) in Prague. The treaty would limit each country to 1,550 nuclear warheads, a 30% reduction from the Moscow Treaty (aka SORT).

Of course, because Barack Obama supports it, the Republicans oppose it in true knee-jerk fashion. Never mind that any substance-based opposition is not based on fact. Never mind that arms control has a long history of bipartisan support, with the Senate ratifying the Moscow Treaty 95-0. Never mind that 1,550 warheads is more than a sufficient nuclear deterrent. Never mind that reducing the number of nuclear weapons will make the U.S. safer by reducing the threat of nuclear terrorism.

No, Republicans would rather oppose ratifying the treaty, which needs 67 votes in the Senate, just so they can make Obama look bad. But haven't we come to expect this kind of petty recklessness from the GOP?